Barry A. Harvey

How does one authentically hear and live out the gospel in North America? This new book attempts to answer this question in a way that reveals much about the nature of Christian faith today and its relation to contemporary culture. In keeping with the aims of the acclaimed Gospel and Our Culture series, StormFront investigates how the gospel intersects American culture and seeks to reorient the church to its full and proper missional vocation. Four authors noted for their understanding of modern church life offer a sober yet hopeful critique of American culture that focuses on consumerism and the privatization of religion, and they challenge the Christian church to embrace its corporate task to be salt and light to the world. Amid the many books on the subject, this one is distinctive in its concern for application. By constrasting contemporary life with a thoroughgoing reading of the biblical narrative, the authors help American Christians discern how our cultural location makes it difficult to live out the transformative message of the gospel. Few readers will fail to be engaged by the lessons offered here. Series: The Gospel and Our Culture Series Series Editors: Craig Van Gelder (general editor) A series to foster the missional encounter of the gospel with North American culture. Titles in this Series: Bearing the Witness of the Spirit: Lesslie Newbigin's Theology of Cultural Plurality Confident Witness -- Changing World: Rediscovering the Gospel in North America The Continuing Conversion of the Church Missional Church: A Vision for the Sending of the Church in North America StormFront: The Good News of God

What is the church, and what is essential to it particularly in a post-Christian age? In contrast to "the City," that is, the world (including the hedonism and narcissism of popular culture) that virtually all human beings now inhabit, the author calls upon the church to remember that it is "Another City" that does not compromise itself by giving allegiance to any political entity that belongs to this world. He points out how the hedonism and narcissism of "the City" or popular culture have been embraced also by those who make up Christ's body, the church, without seeing that this contradicts biblical faith. In contrast, the early Christians represented a subversive presence or "Another City" within the wider Roman society. In time, however, the church succumbed to "the City, became aligned with the empire, gained power, and began to render to Caesar what belonged to God." Today what was once called "Christendom" is rapidly eroding. Christianity no longer dominates as in the past. In such a situation, Harvey says, it is time for the church to remember that it is "Another City" and that it does not compromise itself by giving allegiance to any political entity that belongs to this world. Instead, the church has the courage to live, like Israel of old, in the diaspora as a distinct minority, remaining an uncompromising and faithful servant of God's final (though still future) triumph in the risen Christ. Barry A. Harvey teaches systematic theology at Baylor University.>